DARPA pilot-ware unflappable in wing-fling damage test Robot aeroplanes are rapidly learning how to do pretty much anything that a human pilot can. The droid flyboys can take off, land, follow people about and even do in-flight refuelling. Plans are afoot to teach them how to do a catapult launch and arrested deck landings on aircraft carriers, too, and to fly entire strike missions …
Sounds like they are doing ever so well de-humanising warfare. Good show chaps, but remember in such a war the only casualties will be civilians.
I think you should stop wallowing in your own conceit and start thinking about the consequences. Yes, contrary to what your hippy tree-hugging parents told you, there are consequences. Who'da thunk it?
"...airplane's new vehicle configuration..." - gotta love the terminology. Fleshy version: "Mayday, mayday, my wing has been... erm... updated by a ground-launched airborne-vehicle reconfiguration device."
Shouldn't this article be in RotM [tm]?
As if I need to explain the black helicopter...
Lewis,
When DARPA cedes to Autonomous Robotic Control/NIRobotIQ Mastery will they have AI Powerful Control.
Until such Times, are they merely playing catch up....... and in an Environment in which XXXXPonential Progress is the De Facto Norm, does that mean that they will fall further behind until such Times as they have NIRobotIQ Mastery.
Given their Bottomless Money Pit, one does wonder why they don't just buy IT in, even if it is Foreign Sourced, which it must be as they still haven't shown any AI Powerful Control. I suppose that is their Enigmatic Dilemma.
Of course, such Tardiness which would balk at Foreign Investment is not necessarily shared with other Interested Parties, who may Realise that such Nationalism is an Impediment to Progress.
Indeed, El Reg has even touched upon the dangers ..... http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06/12/rand_corp_research_development_study/
Is this some sort of code based on the "Capitalisation of apparently Random Alpabetic Pictograms"?
I can only get gibberish out of your code though.
WDARCNMAPC
UTEXPDFNTNM
GBMPIFSAPCIED
...
Can anyone decode it? Or are you just "Whiling away Eons by writing Interesting but Randomly capitalised Diatribes"?
(I'm going anonymous in case I'm missing the obvious and about to be flamed by millions explaining how to interpret the 'secret' message.)
...that if you put a big enough engine on a brick it will fly.
I don't really see how losing a wing is that big an issue, the more unstable the airframe the bettter the maneuverability. These days it's software that's keeping a fighter jet flyable so the comments about the part of fleshies and top guns are laughable. The software left the fleshies behind long ago, their major contribution is to point the thing in the right direction and refrain from passing out but not in that order.
Providing a human interface somewhere has control over the on/ off switch, taking humans out of the picture is a pretty good thing when you consider the minimal life expectancy of a WWII pilot. And if the software can return with something economically repairable after being seriously shot up then all the better.
My Dad was in the RAF in North Africa and remembers seeing one of his mates who was a tailgunner in a Marauder B26 being taken out in several pieces, nothing wrong in avoiding that.
Although DARPA's current plans are for strike aircraft, real world concerns will probably see this software find a home in our current line of limited-use drones, and in our current line of drones, any kind of disaster recovery is a good thing. So the bad guy makes a near-miss on a Predator or the like and knocks off a few pieces. With this software, as long as it's still controllable, the drone can limp home and get patched up--less expensive than a full-on replacement.
Oh, and to whoever said the only casualties in a mechanized war are civilians, here's to hoping these advances reduce the chance of *any* casualties: civilian or otherwise. Better two machines wreck each other than two men, after all. And until further notice, there will still be a human C&C, so there will *always* be a human military target.
@ AC #1: quite, the F-15 landing sans one wing was brilliant. as with this F-18 model, the huge fuselage of the eagle helped to maintain some lift, that and the gigantic control surfaces.
@ DARPA: cute. but nothing more. as Chris W noted, put a bick enough engine on a brick and it will fly. Paint stripes on it and it works even better. look at some of the things model airplane enthusiasts fly on the weekend. from lawnmowers to snoopy's doghouse, it's all there. The fact that the wing was dropped just outside the flaps also helped the 'bot maintain flight. in the head-opn shot the deployed flaps on the truncated wing are clearly visible. the clean "break" also helped reduce turbulence. a real F-18 has a lot of composites in the wing. if one were to fall off i surmise that quite a bit of peeling of the remaining stump would take place, creating drag and turbulence.
repeat the experiment en vivo and you'll get my vote.
The black chopper 'cause it will now be harder to shoot down.
Thats amanfromMars, that is. He is from Mars and merely a visitor to this beautiful blue planet.
You'll find his posts become an acquired taste. Some of them are a bit more conventional than others, some seem like someone forgot to run the spelling/abbreviation/word replacer on them (The one that replaces the "ex"- prefix to words with "XXXX", replaces *it* with *IT*), some of them appear gibberish and some generate some really "witty" words, contractions and phrases.
You're better off humouring him, he may (or may not) have friends called Marvin.
All of these are valid counterpoints to the DARPA 'droid warware tech demo, all of which I am sure DARPA are well aware.
This does not detract from the achievement to-date, I think Kai H's scepticism is a tad strong.
I would like to think DARPA / RayColl / others will move forward to more realistic scenarios, especially the progressively increasing damage / unpredictable drag situation. Shooting the model with (scale!) AA would also provide that fine combo of entertainment and information.
My physics is a bit fuzzy, but I seem to recall something about mass/lift ratios having something to do with why smaller aircraft need less wing surface area to stay aloft, or something.
As such, were this a full sized aircraft instead of a scale model, I would be very impressed. Mind you I'm still impressed, but since I don't know the exact scale of the model, I can't be sure of how impressed I actually am.
"(I'm going anonymous in case I'm missing the obvious and about to be flamed by millions explaining how to interpret the 'secret' message.)" ... By Anonymous Coward Posted Friday 13th June 2008 10:35 GMT
Is that wise, AC? Have you ever tried ignoring the Capitalisation 42 Concentrate on the Sub Context, which you can assume to be Multi Cored and Addressing Multiple Threads. You may also like to consider that some threads are Novel and Innovative too, with no Past Reference Point to tarnish your views/form your thoughts.
For those you will have to use your own Intelligence/Imagination.
they knew where the wing would break, which makes this a potentially rigged test. The software could have been tweaked to make sure it would handle it, or the break point could have been chosen to leave the plane still flyable.
For the next test, let's get a guy with a flak cannon taking potshots at it, and see how well it does.
RObots fighting robots each with partial autonomy controlled by several human interactees.
Does this sound like Total Annihilation/Supreme Commander to anyone else? Granted, we aren't fighting for resources on alien planets. Just ours.
We'll have robots on the ground and robots in the air to protect the robots on the ground, presumably you won't even need soldiers to go in and secure a region once it's been attacked, you can just send in bureaucrats to begin signing reconstruction deals with the natives.
Did anyone watch the linked vid? Notice the blanked out aileron movement? Seeing as they can only conventionally move up or down, makes me wonder if this one is doing something a little different...like maybe splitting in two to make a new flying surface rather than remaining as a control surface?
As hinted above , 60% more accurately would be one wing off at the root AND the "bit" that fell off (this craft is of lifting body type, a consequence of its design goals ie to have as wide a speed range as possible and maintain the highest possible manouverability/control). I reckon at existing air density/likely velocity , the model would then have had the glide ratio of a plumbers toolbag and even HAL would have been saying "Daisy daisy , i am going DOWN" in calm and even tones. Roll on the Emag Res drive............oh,amanfromMars has just told me to "shut it punk" so i will.
Have a good one ........
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